Here are some of my Instagram snaps from our trip… There’s more to come! We spent the 4th at the W hotel in Scottsdale where I broke out my Missguided one piece that I’m in love with! We hiked up Camelback mountain the first day and on the way to Sedona I had my first experience with In-n-Out…. So freaking good!!! I have been drinking lots and lots of prickly pear margaritas which are also mouth watering and refreshing in the Zona heat. I’ve surprisingly have gotten used to the dry heat here and also have fallen in love with the desert…

Don’t forget to follow TheNeonCherokee on Instagram for more pictures from the trip!

She was born in the wild wild west on the fourth of July. She grew up with horses named Pink and Floyd. She learned to check her boots for snakes and scorpions when she first started walking. She was the fastest shoot in the west and no cowboy dared to challenge her in fear of leaving with some of his manhood not in tacked. She lived in an adobe style home with a large wooden carved front door, a saguaro cactus in her front yard, and stucco wall with cut out windows. In her bedroom lay a bed on a stucco platform, a rain stick propped up in the corner, a cow skull hung above her mattress. She drank tequila and watched old westerns all day while the dust storms howled outside. She wore Buffalo Turquoise laid in silver that came from the Native Americans on the reservation.

I don’t always drink bloody Mary’s, but when I do its usually before a flight…

Getting ready to visit my fiancés home town in Scottsdale Arizona and his friends (who are some of my favorite people) . I am more than ecstatic for one I have never seen the true desert, all full of cacti and roadrunners, two, I am able to escape the cold summer in Chicago, and three an excuse to buy new clothes of course… I made some major purchases, mostly from Missguided and a company I recently fell in love with called Nelly. I am so excited to wear my one piece and Swim Amara palm tree print bikini bottom from Don’t Blow the Illusion. My cowboy boots are by Very Volatile and hat is Minnetonka!

The past year has been full of fall leaves the color of sunrise, meetings in coffee shops other than Starbucks, eating raw oysters, drinking champagne, wandering down roads that famous writers such as Hemingway, gangsters, singers, artists all shared. Running down Michigan Ave and Lakeshore Drive makes me feel like I’m not too far from the ocean even though it is an illusion and is just an oversized lake. Staying warm through the chilling nights with bourbon and and snuggling close to my fiancé. The Chicago Art Institute is free on Thursdays to Chicago residents and I wander down the same hallways pictured in Ferris Bueller, my favorite is the impressionism, Monet, Renoir, Cézanne, and on the other spectrum Andy Warhol, Jackson Pollock… Jewelry and makeup from Cleopatra in the Egyptian period, I would spend hours in awe.

There is no denying the magic that this city possess… but I have grown cold, something that I am not accustomed to, and not only by the cold summer days and freezing winter nights, the people on the street turn you cold. Children are being shot everyday, women robbed on the subway, you learn to not smile. You evolve into someone else. The city does that to you. You arrive so warm hearted that you give a man $20 for a train ticket home only to spot him days later begging people for more, he sees you too and turns away remembering your kind face. I miss the warm sun of Florida, my mothers embrace on those tough days, the ocean and the feeling of being nothing in an infinite body of water as you run into manatees and sea turtles like a mermaid having a tea party… The art and jazz and bourbon can’t keep you as warm as you hopped..

It has been a very cold year in Chicago, but has gone by very fast. I the job that I wanted when I moved to Chicago and have been styling for Akira, Chicago born boutique… I was accepted to Columbia College and am looking forward to attending! These are some snaps from the past year and will be more to come so enjoy!